10-43: Be Advised...

with Doug Wyllie, PoliceOne Editor in Chief

P1 Humor Corner: Officer Murphy's Laws

Editor’s Note:

Editor’s Note: This list — or some variant of it — has been submitted to PoliceOne by several of our members. We’ve compiled as many as we could find from all those lists and present it here for your enjoyment. Of course, we encourage you to add your own Officer Murphy’s Laws in the comments field below. Stay safe.

Anything that can go wrong, typically will, and usually at the worst possible moment. For example...

• If you’ve cleared the entire house and encountered no resistance (you have nto been shot at or cursed at by its occupants), you’ve probably hit the wrong bleeping house.

• The newly elected Sheriff is not the one you voted for, and he knows it!

• Your pen will only run out of ink when you are ready to write a ticket.

• NCIC will be down anytime you see a car listed on a hot sheet.

• You will never get a bomb threat call until the squad is away on training.

• The experience of your DA is inversely proportional to the importance of the case he is prosecuting.

• Word processors only delete reports when they are nearly done.

• In a physical confrontation involving more than one officer, any impact weapon used will strike cops more times than crooks.

• Do unto others, but do it first.

• There is an inverse relationship between the number of auto club stickers on a rear bumper and how well the person drives.

• You are ALWAYS downwind from pepper spray.

• No one's idea is a good idea until it becomes another person's idea...usually the Chief's.

• There is nothing more satisfying that having someone take a shot at you and miss.

• All great discoveries are made by mistake.

• If there is a possibility of several things going wrong the one that will cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong.

• The more a weapon costs, the farther you will have to send it away to be repaired.

• Field experience is something you don't get until just after you need it.

• Anything you do can get you shot, including nothing.

• High speed chases will always proceed from an area of light traffic to an area of extremely heavy traffic.

• If you know someone who tortures animals and wets the bed, he is either a serial killer or he works for Internal Affairs.

• If a cop swings a baton in a fight, he will hit other cops more often than he will hit the bad guys he swings at.

• Domestic arguments will always migrate from an area of few available weapons (living room), to an area with many available weapons (kitchen).

• If you have just punched out a handcuffed prisoner for spitting at you, you are about to become a star on the 6 o'clock news.

• Bullets work on veteran cops too. They also work on weight lifters, martial arts experts, department marksmen, Vice cops, and others who consider themselves immortal.

• When a civilian sees a blue lights approaching at a high rate of speed, he will always pull into the lane the you need to use.

• You can never drive slow enough to please the citizens who don't need a cop, and you can never drive fast enough to please the ones who do.

• Any suspect with a rifle is a better shot than any cop with a pistol.

• On any call, there will always be more bad guys than there are good guys, and the farther away your backup, the more there will be.

• Whatever you are about to do, if there is a good chance it will get you killed, you probably shouldn't do it.

• The better you do your job, the more likely you are to be shot, injured, civilian complaints, sued, investigated, or subpoenaed on your day off.

About the author

Doug Wyllie is Editor in Chief of PoliceOne, responsible for setting the editorial direction of the website and managing the planned editorial features by our roster of expert writers. An award-winning columnist — he is the 2014 Western Publishing Association "Maggie Award" winner in the category of Best Regularly Featured Digital Edition Column — Doug has authored more than 800 feature articles and tactical tips on a wide range of topics and trends that affect the law enforcement community. Doug is a member of International Law Enforcement Educators and Trainers Association (ILEETA), an Associate Member of the California Peace Officers' Association (CPOA), and a member of the Public Safety Writers Association (PSWA). Even in his "spare" time, he is active in his support for the law enforcement community, contributing his time and talents toward police-related charitable events as well as participating in force-on-force training, search-and-rescue training, and other scenario-based training designed to prepare cops for the fight they face every day on the street.

Read more articles by PoliceOne Editor in Chief Doug Wyllie by clicking here.